I. Field
The present invention relates generally to communication, and more specifically to techniques for setting up a connection in a communication system.
II. Background
In a communication system, a user terminal communicates with an access point in order to obtain various services such as voice, packet data, and so on. A session is typically established for the user terminal to facilitate communication. As part of the session establishment, the user terminal and the access point may negotiate for various configurable protocols and select parameters for these protocols. A session is often considered as a collection of information for protocols, security keys, user capabilities, and so on, which is to be used for communication between the user terminal and the access point. Hence, the terms “session” and “session information” are often used interchangeably.
For proper operation, the configured protocols need to be synchronized at the user terminal and the session-holding access point, which is the access point currently holding the session for the user terminal. The user terminal may be mobile and, while in a power save mode, may have moved from the coverage area of the session-holding access point into the coverage area of a new access point. If the user terminal thereafter enters an active mode (e.g., due to a user-initiated call or a page from the system) while under the coverage of the new access point, then the user terminal may attempt to communicate with the new access point. However, the new access point typically does not know the configured protocols used by the user terminal. Communication with the new access point typically commences only after the session for the user terminal has been retrieved from the session-holding access point or a new session has been established with the new access point.
The new access point may obtain the session previously established for the user terminal in several ways. In one method, the user terminal provides the new access point with the address of the session-holding access point. The new access point then fetches the session from the session-holding access point. In another method, the user terminal sends the entire list of configured protocols (or parameters that are set to non-default values) to the new access point. The new access point then sets up the appropriate protocols based on the information received from the user terminal. For both methods, a delay is incurred to either fetch the session from the session-holding access point or receive the session information from the user terminal. Furthermore, system resources are expended to send the session information from either the session-holding access point or the user terminal to the new access point.
There is therefore a need in the art for techniques to efficiently set up a connection between a user terminal and an access point.